Ian Wicenski Senior Project

5/19/19 Throughout this week I have achieved a lot. I might even say the most progress was made in these past 5 work days. While my work days have been decreasing in length, the value of what I accomplish on campus increases everyday. After learning the process of bees waxing steel sculptures, I was able to finalize many of my metal pieces including a stool I made between the fall and spring terms. I was able to put that stool in the Proctor art show which I was happy about. I am also very happy to have finalized my flower pots and kayak sculpture. The garden sculpture will be left un-bees waxed so it can get a unique rusted, weathered look. Unfortunately, this week’s surprises were not the good kind as the ceramic pots I made for that same sculpture were damaged in the kiln along with a vase I threw. This is not an enormous concern though because I still consider the garden sculpture a great success. I am preparing to finish my second major project along with a little desk lamp ov

Today began in the forge by bees waxing all of my currently finished sculptures. I started with the stool I constructed spring term. A blow torch was used to heat the steel and then melted bees wax was poured over each sculpture. I used a towel to dry the artworks and wipe off any excess wax. I only have a photo of the stool for now. As far as ceramics go, I am wrapping things up. I am done making new pieces and all of my current pieces have been glazed and re-fired. All that's left to do now, is finish combining any of the collaboration projects with a steel aspect.     Featured above are the half dome shaped parts of my second major piece, the lampshade which will sit on a steel base, and a black and plain bowl. Unfortunately, the pots designed for the garden sculpture will not be making any kind of showing at express fest on account of the fact that they exploded in the kiln. However, I still see this as an absolute win. This is because I plan to ge

I began my day by heading into Slocumb to glaze the last of my ceramic pieces. Unfortunately, I took no pictures of what I did in Slocumb today. The pieces I glazed were the second major project, a black and white collapsible globe like structure, a simple bowl, and a lamp shade to be put on a metal base. I spent about a half an hour in the studio before heading over to the forge. Once again, I came out with no photos but this time because my phone died in the forge. I spent my time finishing my set of flower pots and kayak sculpture. I cut a cockpit in the kayak and rotated the blades on the paddle to replicate a right-handed paddle, rather than a left one. I completed welding the legs onto the steel rings of the flower pot holders and ground the excess steel off. Tomorrow I should be able to bees wax these so they are finally finished. Today's hours: 2 1/2 Total hours: 51 1/2! Hours completed!

Today was very similar to yesterday but without the trip to concord. I spent about an hour in the forge working on the same pinch pot designs as yesterday, but my time was cut short because the forge needed to be closed. To still make good progress on my senior project, I decided to begin work on a new pamphlet design with a couple pictures of some ceramic pieces.   The first is a burger themed set of coasters I have made for my family, the second is just kind of a universal container for... anything you can put in it? On a final note, the vase that I put so much effort into throwing the other day exploded in the kiln. I saw it coming a mile away though because the vase was less than a foot high and still weighed like 100 pounds because the walls were so thick. Today's hours: 3 Total hours: 49... one more hour required but there is still much work to be done!

Today was focused on my forge work. I spent about two hours working on another one of my smaller collaboration projects. This piece is a series of three small pinch pots held by steel legs attached to rings.     I used a very thin steel rod to heat and hammer into a circle. I achieved the shape by hitting it around a horn for a more uniform curve. The legs were actually quite easy, as I cold forged most of the bends. I only needed to heat the steel to smooth out any unwanted ripples in the rod. I welded each leg on and ground the excess steel off the top. I have one completely finished and need to make legs for both others. I also made an excursion to concord to pick up some sheet copper to use on another one of my projects, serving spoons. Today's hours: 4 Total hours: 46

Today was a very successful day in the forge! I completed the four support legs of my garden sculpture. To do this I cut four bars of steel to be two feet in length. I heated the middle of each bar enough to bend in a vice and then bent one end in the opposite direction, creating a zig-zag shape. The second bend is a smaller length so I tapered that into a wedge to fit to the side of the hanger. The other, longer end was tapered into a point to stick into the ground. All four legs are the same and have been welded onto the base of the sculpture. This stands about seven feet tall out of the ground. I also spent a little time in the ceramics studio to trim and smooth my flower pots for this project. Today's hours: 5 1/2 Total hours: 42

5/11/19 I made a ton of headway on all of my pieces with week. I got the vast majority of my first major project done. It is a garden sculpture being made to be put in my front yard. The design is of a steel hook sculpture that looks kind of like a coat hanger. It is a pole that stands about six feet tall with three large hooks sprouting in three directions, at varying heights. On these hooks will be three ceramic pots for any kind of flower. At the base of the pole will be four right angled bars that can stick in the ground as stakes to provide support for the sculpture in any direction. I have all the hooks done and only need to attach the supports to the bottom of the steel component. The ceramic pots still need to be trimmed and fired, then glazed and fired again but this is an easy process that mostly takes time rather than the effort of originally throwing a pot their size. I made solid progress on the ceramic portion of my second major piec

5/11/19 Today was essentially the same as Thursday but instead of adding new photos, I added Friday's and changed the order of a few from this week. I accidentally put many of this weeks photos in a backwards order, which wouldn't have made sense in a chronological slideshow. I am super close to finishing the slideshow, all that remains is adding this coming weeks pictures to it. At some point this week I'll need to start on that pamphlet design. I did a few sketches today on paper to get an idea of what I could have it look like, but for the life of me I cannot find them and I never took pictures! What I plan to have on the handheld brochures is an outline of every piece I made. Pictures of each artwork will be alongside a brief description of what it is, and why I wanted to make it. I will also include a very short summary of the making processes. All in all, a lot of good work was done and I am close to wrapping up this part of my senior project. Today's hours: 2

5/10/19 I made very good progress on my garden sculpture project in the forge today. I fixed the hooks to the main pole by hammering out the long ends into a flat taper, and then I welded them on both sides. This means all three hanger hooks have been attached and in addition to this, the welds have been cleaned up.    Now, all I need to do is attach four bars which stick out from the bottom in all directions. They bend at a ninety degree angle and will taper into points. These will act as stakes that can support the sculpture in any direction when embedded into the lawn. My ceramic work today was spent trimming previous pieces as well as drying this one displayed in the photo. This is my second major piece in production. The four quarter spheres will be able to rotate inside one another and being attached via string, the completed sphere will be able to open and close sideways. They will be fixed with epoxy to steel rings around a steel rod like a globe. Today's hours:

5/9/19 It was earth day on Proctors Campus today so I stayed home to work on my presentation. Much of my day was actually spent working at my parents bakery (Pleasant Lake Cheesecake Company) but upon getting home in the afternoon, I continued where I left off last Saturday. Adding more pictures and having a video now to add has made the presentation much more of an in depth look at what I do behind the scenes. I spent another two hours organizing all of the photos I've taken of my projects and compiling the new ones in the slideshow. I know more pictures and videos have been taken by other people in both work places so my next step is to contact them and include those as well. I am actually pretty close to finishing the slideshow presentation. After I complete it, I will design a guide pamphlet outlining all of my pieces on display. Today's hours: 2 Total hours: 29

5/8/19 I spent all of my available time doing a lot of ceramic work today. Being the last day for any kind of wet work, the pressure was put on to construct the clay components of my major pieces. I successfully threw the three pots required for my garden sculpture. I am happy with the similarity in both size and shape.     In addition to this, I made my first steps toward completing the second major piece as well. It is four quarters of a sphere, ranging in size to fit inside one another. They will be fixed to steel rings around a rod to make a collapsible globe. It might be tough to explain and I cannot provide any pictures, due to the fact that all of the pieces are buried in what feels like a pound of plastic bags but I will show pics when I am farther along. Today's hours: 3 Total hours: 27 - over half way!!!

5/8/19 Today began with about a half hour of ceramics. I used this time mainly to glaze some previously fired sculptures. The majority of my day was spent in the forge. From the morning, through lunch, until classes ended I was working on my first major collaborative piece! I am constructing a garden sculpture designed to hang three suspended ceramic flower pots from large steel hooks.   I began with a long metal pole about 8 feet in length. I heated the metal just before then end and bent it around a large steel horn to get the desired curve (this is the large one seen in the third photo). Then, I heated the end of that curve and hammered it around an anvil horn to get the smaller curve. This created a nice base pole with a hook already attached, standing at about 6 feet tall. I created two more hooks identical in size, but on smaller poles. I am currently in between the process of hammering out the straight ends of the hooks and welding them onto the original 6 foot pole. I w

5/7/19 Today was a shorter day than usual, clocking in at only 3 1/2 hours of total work time. I spent the first part of my morning in the forge, working on my kayak sculpture. I reshaped the hull a slight amount and fixed the deck on with some welds around the edge. I still need to clean up the weld and cut the cockpit in but good progress is being made. I went to do a couple hours of ceramic work to finish my day. I trimmed some already thrown pieces of mine and then I decided to really push myself and practice throwing big pottery. I threw what felt like it must've been eight pounds of clay and, while about half of that volume ended up either breaking off or turning into slip, a made off with a nice vase to be trimmed and fired.   The vase stands at about 9 1/2 inches tall. I also threw a bowl.       Today's hours: 3 1/2 Total hours: 19

5/5/19 Quite a lot happened this week pertaining to my senior project. The first major “surprise” was breaking my ankle the weekend before. I thought I’d still be able to get by in martial arts but was quickly proven wrong. I made an important decision to return to classes for the remaining three weeks of the year (not a very fantastic way to end a four year proctor career) instead of breaking my bones any further. The next big surprise came the day after, when in the afternoon following a full class day, my kayak coach suggested simply doing a different senior project. I thought that would be impossible because of all the paperwork involved but all I needed to do was ask about it. It turned out to be very possible because I just enjoyed a week of metal sculpture and ceramics! So much is open ended surrounding my project that it feels very relaxed. All I really have to do is make any form of metal or ceramic pieces, although I have my own ambitious goals to keep my

5/4/19 Day 6 of senior project, the first Saturday, was spent at home working on the visual presentation aspect of my project. My plan is to compile many of the photos and videos I take into a slideshow to have on display at express fest. This can be a good way for people to see a little bit of what I was doing behind the scenes as well as how I did it. Alongside this presentation reel, I want to have small brochures that describe the art pieces I will have on display. These will be small, in a basket for people to pick up and browse at their own leisure. I got a bunch of good progress done but there is still much to do. I will add more next week when I've done more art! Todays hours: 2 Total hours: 15 1/2

5/3/19 Today was evenly split between both the forge and Slocumb. Beginning at the forge around 11:00 I spent two hours working on the hull of a steel kayak, to go with the paddle I forged yesterday. The original suggestion was to use an English wheel to curve the piece of sheet metal but my project is too small. I hammered, plasma-cut, and welded it mostly into shape. Afterwards I ground the excess weld off to make it the right shape.   Then I spent two more hours of my time doing ceramic work. This is my major accomplishment of the day, a clay burger which can be taken apart to be used as a set of four coasters, a patty, cheese slice, tomato slice, and lettuce leaf. I simply rolled out a slab of clay and cut circles of varying sizes and molded them into the required shapes. The bottom "bun" has a long peg protruding from the middle that reaches through all of the coasters to keep the set together. Today's time: 4 hours Total time: 13 1/2 hours

5/2/19 Today marks the first day of my finally decided senior project. I am splitting my time between the proctor forge and ceramic studio in order to create art that combines both crafts. I arrived on campus and began in the forge to finish an aspect of one of my metal sculptures. I am currently working on a little paddle and kayak, made from forged steel. The paddle has an offset of about a 45 degree angle. This took about two hours start to finish. I began with the square bar seen in the first picture and thinned it using the gas forge and a hammer. I then thinned the edges and tapered them into the paddle shape. A little grinding got the edges to look really nice. As seen in the last picture, I finished by bending each of the blades of the paddle into an artistically rendered curve. Next I headed over to ceramics. After spending about an hour and a half working with clay today, I have two new pieces drying, waiting to be trimmed as well as four pieces glazed. These l

5/1/19 Last night and the end of today both took quite extreme, unexpected turns. Late last night, I debated the practicality of my project. How am I supposed to realistically complete a martial arts based project of 100 hours, if I cannot even do most of the martial arts? I decided it would be best to return to classes. So because of a combination of that and another detail I will mention after, I will now describe a regular day of Wednesday classes. My day began with G block finance with Doug Houston. Due to senior project there are about five kids remaining in that class, and all the rest for that matter. We discussed the matter of a final project all class. Next was F block literature. Karin Clough introduced me to a new novel called Prep. I have not read any yet but it's supposed to center around a girls experience as a transfer student in a very prestigious high school. For A block I had a study block. I ate two bowls of Raisin Bran and Kix cereal while doing college course

4/30/19 I began my day with gym workouts this time, also sticking to the same arm and core exercises. After spending about another one and a half hours in the weight room I headed home. I drove out to Lebanon to visit the first of two dojos to discuss things like payment and schedule exact time of day meetings. When I arrived at Infinity Martial Fitness, I met a guy named Justyn. We talked for a while and he told me he is one of the instructors there. He helps to train both youth classes and adult classes and he had studied Jiu Jitsu for about nine years. It's a nice space outfitted with punching bags, a ragdoll dummy, weights, etc. After a good amount of discussion and observing a kids course take place, a man named Nick arrived. Nick is the head of the dojo so he was the one to discuss payment and such. I also inquired about my ankle injury. My ankle is actually broken so it has been decided that I can do mostly upper body technique stuff. I suspect I wont be able to d